Research Projects

The exopolysaccharide Levan is a valuable commercial product produced by many organisms. Its yield can be enhanced by adding sucrose, which generates equal amounts of glucose and fructose upon hydrolysis. While fructose is used to produce Levan, the organism utilizes glucose. The excess glucose generated can be utilized to produce another value-added product. The same organism can also produce Amarphadiene, a precursor for the synthesis of the antimalarial drug Artemisinin, through a non-competing mevalonate pathway that uses glucose without affecting biomass production. By introducing a gene ADs that converts farnesyl diphosphate from the mevalonate pathway to amorphadiene, Bacillus subtilis can produce both Levan and Amorphadiene simultaneously. This proposal employs a systems modelling approach to optimize the yields of Levan and Amorphadiene, and the engineered strain will be experimentally validated to efficiently convert sucrose to Levan and Amorphadiene.